SIX MONTHS SINCE AL HOL CLOSURE: STAFF ACCOUNT BY Mahmoud*, CHILD PROTECTION CASE WORKER FOR SAVE THE CHILDREN IN SYRIA
When Leila* and her children arrived in Ar Raqqa, Syria, in February this year, they found themselves in surroundings that felt completely unfamiliar. Her children had spent almost their entire lives in Al Hol camp in northeastern Syria, and adjusting to life outside its fences was overwhelming.
“The children couldn’t believe they were living in a house,” Leila told me. “At first, they didn’t even know what a house was.”
For many people, it is almost impossible to imagine a child not recognising a home. But Leila’s family had spent seven years living in tents in the sprawling Al Hol camp. Most were women and children from Syria and Iraq, alongside families from about 60 other countries, with daily life marked by violence, malnutrition and disease, while access to healthcare and education was severely limited.
At its peak, Al Hol was home to about 73,000 people, displaced following the collapse of ISIS in 2019 with their movements restricted. Although no child in the camp was ever charged with any wrongdoing, thousands were effectively detained because of allegations levelled at adults in their families. Over the years many gradually left, repatriated to their home countries but 24,000 people still remained when the camp was shut down earlier this year amid an uptick in violence in the region.
Families walked out with nothing: no assistance, no papers, and nowhere to go. Thousands of children and their mothers scattered across Syria in a matter of weeks.
In Ar Raqqa city, where I now work as a child protection case worker for Save the Children, there are an estimated 325 families from Al Hol.
Six months on, many of these children are still struggling to re-integrate into society, facing stigma from others, with some of them too scared to leave the home. One girl told me that she wishes people would stop seeing her and her family as ISIS.
The challenges are immense. Among the households we support, not one has a stable source of income. Nine out of 10 families are without fathers, men who have either been killed or detained. Some receive small, irregular cash remittances from relatives living abroad. Some of the mothers take on bits of work.
For some children, survival means working too. They spend their days rummaging for plastic and metal in areas where they risk coming across landmines and other unexploded ordnances like those that have killed hundreds of people across Syria.
Raqqa bears the scars of Syria’s 14-year-war. It is one of the most bombed-out cities in the country. Many of Al Hol’s children are now living in the skeletons of apartment buildings, with no running water or electricity, sometimes not even walls. A seven-year-old girl we support told me she is too scared to go to the toilet at night due to pests and insects.
Basic services like healthcare and education are out of reach for many children, due to economic challenges and a lack of identity documents. And even where a family can reach a service, they are still contending with everything else: no income, no settled place to live, and neighbours who are wary of where they came from.
Save the Children is supporting 150 people – mostly children – mainly through case management work, liaising with authorities and other organisations to try to find temporary solutions so that children can learn while the issues are ironed out.
But temporary solutions are not enough for these children. The Syrian Government must ease barriers to children enrolling when term starts in September, and set out a clear route for families to obtain the papers they need. Donors, and the governments that committed in February to the dignified reintegration of these families, should fund the services that make that possible.
Hundreds of the foreign nationals trapped in Al Hol are now scattered all over Syria. Governments should trace their nationals, provide consular help and documentation, and bring these children home with their mothers and siblings, without splitting up families who hold different passports.
One girl told me that years ago, she saw a computer in the office of an NGO inside the camp. Ever since, she has dreamed of learning about it and how it works. She should not have to wait any longer – and neither should any of the other children who were born into the ravages of conflict.
ENDS
In Raqqa, Save the Children is currently supporting 150 people, mostly children , who moved there following Al Hol’s closure in February this year. We provide case management, vocational training like plumbing or hairdressing to support employment prospects, and cash assistance to protect children from risks such as child labour and child marriage.